The Trump Investigation(s) Thread

[waitingtoconnect]

Remember when the people defending Trump's mishandling of classified material were so outraged by Hillary Clinton's email?

Its always been this way.

When Bill Clinton was having an affair with an intern several of his accusers also did similar things.

Barrack Obama apparently has tons of confidential stuff.

And there are so many laptops owned by Hunter Biden Putin is bound to find one in Ukraine.

[pr0ner]

The last sentence is highly important. I'll say it again I am wondering about circumstances that may require NOT NORMAL response. Unless I'm misreading it you (and others have said as much) are saying you can't think of any exception. That seems just too dogmatic when you are dealing with potentially fluid asymmetrical situations.

I disagree that it's too dogmatic. The very definition of what we are fighting for requires that there be no exception. Any other way means all is lost. There is no "right answer for the wrong reasons" outcome here.

I would agree with you that the ends can't always justify the means.

[hepcat]

Remember when the people defending Trump's mishandling of classified material were so outraged by Hillary Clinton's email?

Its always been this way.

When Bill Clinton was having an affair with an intern several of his accusers also did similar things.

Yelled about Hillary wiping an email server? Damn, that's some prescient shit.

And there are so many laptops owned by Hunter Biden Putin is bound to find one in Ukraine.

There's the one he used in 1867, the one he used in 1929, the one he used in 1941....he leaves behind more computers than I leave behind broken hearts.

Barrack Obama apparently has tons of confidential stuff.

Nope.

Spoiler:

p.s. I know you were being facetious.

[coopasonic]

All I can think is malchior is calling for a drone strike. I really hope typing that out doesn't bring the FBI to my house. I cannot imagine what other options could be available. Guantanamo? Defenestration? Crap, definitely getting a visit now.

Literally what other options exist if the WH had the will?

[malchior]

Drone strikes are sort of appealing.

For what it is worth the whole thing proves the deep state doesn't exist. Or this moron would not be breathing free air in his summer house 100 feet from where his ex-wife is buried.

[Unagi]

Remember when the people defending Trump's mishandling of classified material were so outraged by Hillary Clinton's email?

Its always been this way.

When Bill Clinton was having an affair with an intern several of his accusers also did similar things.

Yelled about Hillary wiping an email server? Damn, that's some prescient shit.

Sometimes I just don’t understand why you feign obtuseness when you do.
Are you actually forcing waitingtoconect to defend a point you (I can only assume) agree with !?


Bill Clinton’s accusers were just as guilty of infidelity as Bill Clinton… in a manner to the hypocrisy that is people complaining about Hillary’s emails are silent on Trumps top secret documents, etc. but you take the moment to cloud the two issues into one ?

I can honestly only assume you didn’t understand the original comment you replied to.

Or - heck- let me know what your goal was here ?

[malchior]

[hepcat]

Remember when the people defending Trump's mishandling of classified material were so outraged by Hillary Clinton's email?

Its always been this way.

When Bill Clinton was having an affair with an intern several of his accusers also did similar things.

Yelled about Hillary wiping an email server? Damn, that's some prescient shit.

Sometimes I just don’t understand why you feign obtuseness when you do.
Are you actually forcing waitingtoconect to defend a point you (I can only assume) agree with !?


Bill Clinton’s accusers were just as guilty of infidelity as Bill Clinton… in a manner to the hypocrisy that is people complaining about Hillary’s emails are silent on Trumps top secret documents, etc. but you take the moment to cloud the two issues into one ?

I can honestly only assume you didn’t understand the original comment you replied to.

Or - heck- let me know what your goal was here ?

I did misunderstand his original post. I am obtuse. Thank you. However, I was also joking, as I noted he was too.

[Unagi]

It’s cool.
I’m just happy to stand in and help in this moment of misunderstanding so that you two can appreciate each other’s snark, etc.

[El Guapo]

AND it would make the case against Trump tougher. Among one of the unavoidable major risks from any case is that you wind up with a Trump-friendly juror who votes to acquit no matter what. Trump's lawyers would inevitably argue that the whole case is just political vengeance by Biden. There's no way to mitigate that risk entirely, but one thing that would likely help is if the DOJ lawyers can say in court that Biden had zero role in the decision.

This is a real concern that they have to weigh no matter what. I think we need to indict Trump but realize that it might invite further crisis. But that's what we face - a cluster of crises that you have to try to pick the best path through. We elected Biden for that. I have little faith in his judgement personally but he is the guy we have. It seems crazy that should things get bad enough that we'd go hard inflexible and exclude the person with the most authority in the land . Again I'm assuming it'd be a dire situation.

This is where I get a little confused. The situation is not that we would exclude Biden from the decision because things are bad. The point is that Biden / the President is *normally* excluded from this type of decision, and for very good reason given the abuses that can come from presidents directing criminal prosecutions. It's more that I don't see any reason for making an exception to the normal rule by including him in a decision that he normally wouldn't be a part of.

And like I said, indicting Trump would be an exceptional decision by nature, so there is *some* appeal to involving him in something like this. But not enough. And yeah, Biden is the elected one here, but...we elected him, and he used his elected authority to appoint Garland (who was then confirmed by the Senate). And ultimately lots of presidential decisions are delegated to cabinet level people.

The last sentence is highly important. I'll say it again I am wondering about circumstances that may require NOT NORMAL response. Unless I'm misreading it you (and others have said as much) are saying you can't think of any exception. That seems just too dogmatic when you are dealing with potentially fluid asymmetrical situations. I'll also point out the normal process hasn't been working. We keep trying it and it keeps not containing the threat. On top we have actors aiding and abetting him. Barr bent over backwards to protect him. His party in the Senate did the same, etc. Edit: He may continue to get top cover from an increasingly politicized judicial branch (see next post!). And here we are staring down yet another major crisis. It just seems like insanity to say the normal process is the *only* process. Again I'd love for norms to hold and restore confidence in the system...but I really feel like folks have to honestly admit that feels fairly low percentage now.

No, I wouldn't say that there are no exceptions. Essentially every rule / norm has exceptions that make sense. I'm mainly saying that I can't think of any compelling benefit from Biden being involved in the decision, but I can think of a number of compelling downsides / costs from Biden being involved in the decision. So far the only reasons I've heard that make any sense are: (1) the conceptual democracy gains of having Biden involved; and (2) maybe there's some inter-agency issues raised by the intelligence angles here. And the latter is mostly speculative - I'm sure that the DOJ team will have to consider classification related issues (and may need to consult with specialists outside of DOJ) but that doesn't change the fundamentally legal nature of assessing whether Trump broke the law.

If there's a compelling exception? Sure. But I'm highly skeptical that there's a decent reason here.

[malchior]

No, I wouldn't say that there are no exceptions. Essentially every rule / norm has exceptions that make sense. I'm mainly saying that I can't think of any compelling benefit from Biden being involved in the decision, but I can think of a number of compelling downsides / costs from Biden being involved in the decision. So far the only reasons I've heard that make any sense are: (1) the conceptual democracy gains of having Biden involved; and (2) maybe there's some inter-agency issues raised by the intelligence angles here. And the latter is mostly speculative - I'm sure that the DOJ team will have to consider classification related issues (and may need to consult with specialists outside of DOJ) but that doesn't change the fundamentally legal nature of assessing whether Trump broke the law.

If there's a compelling exception? Sure. But I'm highly skeptical that there's a decent reason here.

That's pretty much what I was getting at. I'm not saying there is necessarily a decent reason now...but I suspect there must be some involvement which I'll get to in a second. But still I was mostly wondering what happens if/when this all blows up big and it felt like a lot of pushback as if I was demanding action now. That wasn't the case.

Anyway, I agree that DOJ is the best venue and have dealt with national secret spillage since the espionage act became law. But I keep butting up mentally on the reality that we had a President who was a national security threat to us and *other nations*. And yet despite obvious criminal activity he is still out there essentially stoking violence nightly. It's a time bomb and I can't help but believe we're in for a wild ride here. And the world is watching.

On that note, I've seen multiple accounts that our allies are openly talking about our stability. I saw Rep. Boyle (one of the Philly reps) saying he was openly asked about American instability during at a recent meeting with members of the EU parliament (IIRC). The LA Times also had a piece about some of the external view from foreign diplomats - here.

FWIW I am assuming they've been managing this spill with our allies for some time. But that's where gaps appear to me. The WH said they had no heads up about the search at MAL. I flat out don't believe that. Our foreign allies were learning about a major intelligence spill from public accounts?! That is an example of a good reason to involve Biden (on the sly) and I hope they did. But that's what I'm getting at here at large. There are dimensions to this case at present that clearly involve notification at least if not possible decision making at the Presidential level that might impact the case. It seems reasonably plausible they are wrestling with the lines involved at the moment.

The stakes are sky high right now. What's happening here undermines democracy everywhere. And we're seeing that out in the real world. Theory about the proper execution of justice is great and all when you are inside the guardrails. We're flat out off-roading right now.

One diplomat who spoke with The Times pointed to the months immediately after Jan. 6, 2021, when Republican lawmakers shifted from condemning Trump to taking his side. The period was crucial, he said, because it illustrated that pressure to fall behind Trump was coming from the ground up.

“That’s terribly worrying,” he said. “Because it means that democracy is sick among voters, not just the system, the institutions, the politicians.”

Despite the red flags, several diplomats said they saw the transition of power to Biden, however rocky, and the accountability brought by the Jan. 6 hearings as signs of resilience. One ambassador noted that America has similarly reemerged from the damage wrought by disruptions such as Watergate and the Vietnam War.

...

Although the diplomats disagree over the severity and scope of America’s problems, most are concerned that the country’s deepening polarization is undercutting its standing and reliability. They cite several contributing structural problems, such as paralysis in Congress, partisanship on the Supreme Court, restrictive voting laws at the state level and a fractured news media. Some also accuse Democrats of playing power politics and, over the longer term, abandoning low-income white voters, leaving many disillusioned with the political system and vulnerable to Trump’s breed of populism.

America, according to one diplomat, is a place where “two different worlds are coexisting but they’re not talking to each other.”

The size, power and self-professed moral standing of America give its problems outsize significance. The spillover effects include instability in European governments, turns toward authoritarianism elsewhere and the emboldening of China and Russia, validating President Vladimir Putin’s claim that liberal democracies are fading.

[LawBeefaroni]

Marketing senses say he'll lean into Dark Brandon a bit.

[Grifman]

WTF?



Where are the documents?

[Skinypupy]

NEW: Unsealed detailed inventory of what FBI seized from Trump’s office includes:
— 7 TOP SECRET marked docs
— 43 Empty CLASSIFIED folders
— 28 Empty Return to Staff Sec/Mil. Aid folders
— 26 Magazines/Press Articles 1/2020-11/2020
— 99 Magazines/Press Articles 1/2017-10/2018

A whole bunch of empty classified folders seems bad, but maybe I'm reading too much into that.

[Unagi]

I’d like to think there is some ID on the folders that would clue someone in somewhere as to what was in the folder?

[malchior]

There should be markings about what was in the folder and it should have been signed out to someone. Hard to know missing, lost, sold, buried with Ivana, etc. But indicates incredibly sloppy handling of critical data at best.

[LawBeefaroni]

There should be markings about what was in the folder and it should have been signed out to someone. Hard to know missing, lost, sold, buried with Ivana, etc. But indicates incredibly sloppy handling of critical data at best.

Don't forget stolen. Highly likely that someone coming through the revolving door of Shit Goblin Castle just stole some of them. Maybe a "Rothschild"? Anna was it?

[malchior]

Imagine now you're an FBI agent investigating this spill. You might not know if the folders were emptied before they were sent to MAL or at MAL. They have to figure out what information was possibly exposed and potentially look for evidence that the secret was compromised. There are probably as we speak folks fingerprinting this stuff page by page and folder by folder just to get a list of folks who might have handled them. This is a national intelligence disaster. Anyone else would be in custody right now.

[malchior]

Edit: Just to dash in a little reality - this is how it should work. People mess up but this goes beyond 'messing up' by leaps and bounds.

[El Guapo]

Imagine now you're an FBI agent investigating this spill. You might not know if the folders were emptied before they were sent to MAL or at MAL. They have to figure out what information was possibly exposed and potentially look for evidence that the secret was compromised. There are probably as we speak folks fingerprinting this stuff page by page and folder by folder just to get a list of folks who might have handled them. This is a national intelligence disaster. Anyone else would be in custody right now.

I'm also imagining being a DOJ prosecutor and getting a headache imagining bringing a case against Trump before a jury that's premised in part on finding empty folders. I get why that's a major, major problem, but trying to explain to a jury that having empty folders is the basis for a criminal conviction?

OTOH, *if* they can tie this out to a specific harm, then maybe that swings things the other direction, but I have to imagine proving that out would be a huge challenge.

[Jaymann]

I have a feeling "empty folders" will become the next "but her emails." Deflection, distraction and disinformation uber alles. Completely ignoring the folders that were not empty, and the implication that contents were removed for illegal purposes.

[El Guapo]

I have a feeling "empty folders" will become the next "but her emails." Deflection, distraction and disinformation uber alles. Completely ignoring the folders that were not empty, and the implication that contents were removed for illegal purposes.

What's the over / under for how many times the words "empty folder" will be repeated on Fox News over the weekend? One million?

[malchior]

I'm also imagining being a DOJ prosecutor and getting a headache imagining bringing a case against Trump before a jury that's premised in part on finding empty folders. I get why that's a major, major problem, but trying to explain to a jury that having empty folders is the basis for a criminal conviction?

It's definitely a headache. Beyond the plausible deniability nonsense that'll follow this I think the biggest impact would be the timeline adjudicating the case. The scope of leads that have to be run down are going to take time. There is a scaling problem here that you can't just bring in an army of paralegals/lawyers/investigators to help organize this stuff. Individual documents might need people to be read into various programs.

I have to think there is so much other tangible illegality here that perhaps they wouldn't need to hang anything on 'the folders'. But who knows. The whole thing is a nightmare scenario.

OTOH, *if* they can tie this out to a specific harm, then maybe that swings things the other direction, but I have to imagine proving that out would be a huge challenge.

Maybe. Even one specific harm is enough possibly. It might be best considering the circumstances to bring the narrowest winnable case you can.

[Unagi]

I have a feeling "empty folders" will become the next "but her emails." Deflection, distraction and disinformation uber alles. Completely ignoring the folders that were not empty, and the implication that contents were removed for illegal purposes.

What's the over / under for how many times the words "empty folder" will be repeated on Fox News over the weekend? One million?

To be clear, the FBI raided Trump’s home because they wanted their old empty binders back.

[stessier]

Don't forget, Trump is claiming executive privilege over empty folders.

[Smoove_B]

My only question now is when do they start visiting every single Trump property and turning them upside down for additional files? Or is that too political?

[stessier]

FWIW, NARA noted umfoldered classified documents on the 15 boxes he returned. I don't know how many though.

[El Guapo]

My only question now is when do they start visiting every single Trump property and turning them upside down for additional files? Or is that too political?

I think that they only search other properties if and when they have witnesses saying that there were documents at those properties.

[Zaxxon]

The latest defender of the raid on M-A-L is... *checks notes*

A Mr. Bill Barr.

[Grifman]

Hah, just coming to post this!

[Carpet_pissr]

Fuck that human shaped turd.

[Smoove_B]

Oh wow, that's such a weird coincidence:

Within a week of the FBI search of former President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort, former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows handed over texts and emails to the National Archives that he had not previously turned over from his time in the administration, sources familiar with the matter tell CNN.

Meadows' submission to the Archives was part of a request for all electronic communications covered under the Presidential Records Act. The Archives had become aware earlier this year it did not have everything from Meadows after seeing what he had turned over to the House select committee investigating January 6, 2021. Details of Meadows' submissions to the Archives and the engagement between the two sides have not been previously reported.

"It could be a coincidence, but within a week of the August 8 search on Mar-a-Lago, much more started coming in," one source familiar with the discussions said.

[malchior]

We're at the deny your lying eyes stages of propaganda from the far right.

[LordMortis]

"Are we to believe Trump hid documents marked as classified, rather than comply with the subpoena, and then caused the signing of a false certification? "

Um... Yes? But no more than we are to believe the Federalist is a propaganda arm of right wing reactionaries, grifters, and power brokers.

[stessier]

Transcript from the Trump hearing.

[malchior]

Are these fucking morons actually arguing that this was just a moving mishap? Oh and it was his stuff anyway? This is beyond parody.

What we are talking about here, in the main, are Presidential records in the hands of the 45th President of the United States at a location that was used frequently, during This is not a case about some Department of Defense staffer stuffing military secrets into a paper bag and sneaking
out into the middle of the night. This is, as I say, Presidential records in the hands of 45th President of the United States.

The inventory, in fact, that was just provided and unsealed demonstrates that, the first inventory. It is what you would expect, when you look at it. It is what you would expect if you looked through a bunch of boxes that were moved in a hurry from a residence or an office. It contains all sorts of things. And in there are, again, Presidential records in the hands of 45th President of the United States.

[Carpet_pissr]

Also no one gives a shit about ‘presidential records ‘in the main’’. It’s the non ‘main’ shit we’re concerned about.

[malchior]

I can't say if these arguments have legal merit but they fail basic logic tests.

The first is that you have a criminalized investigation of a dispute with NARA that historically is unenforceable in terms of judicial enforcement. It is a noncriminal scenario where they anticipate that a president, at any time as a president or after, would have the highest level of access to documents that are in his or her possession. So we are in a situation where, literally, they have taken a -- we have characterized it at times as "an overdue library book scenario" where there is a dispute -- not even a dispute, ongoing negotiations with NARA about archives that has suddenly been transformed into a criminal investigation.

Good lord this is dumb. They aren't criminalizing the fact that Trump had the records instead of NARA. They are criminalizing it because he had classified documents he was expressly not allowed to have in his possession. Trump's team returned boxes and they had the documents and they referred it out. From a logic point of view this is sort of like complaining you gave back a late library book, the librarian found a confession to murder tucked into it, and you then say returning the overdue book is not criminal so don't let the government continue to gather evidence about the murder.

And by "suddenly" I guess doesn't mean they've been trying to get the highly secret documents back for over a year. And it probably was criminal exposure the day he left based on the law he signed.

[YellowKing]

And yet somehow President after President for decades have managed to not "accidentally" take classified info out of the White House when they leave office.

[Daehawk]

Lets face facts..he didn't care what was in them he only hoped to sell them for money. Simple. All he is is one walking greed and stupid pile of shit.